On progress, loss, a milestone, and, whatever is next.

Hello again. This newsletter writing thing is going really well… 🤦 Anyway, long time - how have you been?

I’ll kick off with a brief professional update, mostly because the outcomes are top of my mind.

I spent most of the past ~36 months working with a non-profit organisation, Mastodon - initially on a lightweight freelance basis, and then for just over a year that ended in April, as their first full-time Head of Communications.

It was an incredible opportunity, and I think overall it was a great fit for my knowledge, experience and background: combining in-depth understanding of open source communities and code development, with storytelling, public speaking, and communications around the importance of independent technology solutions. The organisation has a relatively young team with great talent, and there was also a chance for me to help to coach and mentor folks along the way. Unfortunately, as a non-profit, the income situation was always challenging, and ultimately I had to part ways with them a couple of months ago.

For a short while there, I was fortunate to be one of the Fediverse’s foremost cheerleaders; I’m genuinely devastated that the role could not continue, and I miss my friends and regular connections in the space.

One of the best parts of the Mastodon role, was the opportunity to spend significant time across 2024-2026 involved in European technology policy conversations, at a variety of events, forums and workshops. I’m keen to bring my experience into more of those spaces in the future, where possible. On that note, I’m going to be in Brussels later this week. It is thrilling, meaningful, and also somewhat surprising that I’m in the position of being able to sit in such conversations, to provide my expertise and opinions. I’m extremely grateful to be invited to contribute in these areas.

Progress

As you’re no doubt aware, there’s some excitement / delusion doing the rounds, that “autocomplete on steroids” may make human intelligence and agency obsolete in the next few years/months/weeks^*. I’ve noted that there is not, however, any equivalent excitement towards the notion of universal basic income, or any way to sustain the humans made obsolete by such supposedly-superintelligent silicon wafers.

In the meantime, I’ve been continuing to spend time learning new things - sometimes assisted by said clever algorithms, and other times hindered by them; always with a cynical eye, and deep sense of distrust.

One thing that became clear over the past 18 months (and, that was on my radar before then), was the need to bring more of my data back home. It very much started with the abuse and destruction of Twitter; since then it became increasingly clear to me that our cloud overlords are unlikely to be benevolent, so I’ve been building a “home lab” using technologies such as Proxmox, Caddy, and other tools. It’s far from all-singing-and-dancing, but it’s a good start. I’ve got a long way to go to free myself from all of the entanglements I’d prefer to avoid.

A recent change has been migrating our long-running podcast, Games at Work dot Biz to a brand new home, on infrastructure in Europe (there’s a theme, here). It was technically complicated and ran against a contractual deadline, but we seem to be in good shape at the moment. I’m looking forward to recording our episode next week as a “Brits takeover” edition, with my good friend Ian Hughes, while my regular co-hosts are unavailable!

Heidi and I have been enjoying our creative time as Forge & Craft over the past 3 years. To date, we’ve done six open studio shows, as well as running stands at Liverpool Makefest, Electromagnetic Field, and the High Tide festival; I’ve also produced three commissioned pieces. Pen plotter artwork remains fascinating to me, and I’ve enjoyed the opportunity to research the history of the space, and to experiment with our own techniques.

I made a concerted effort to resurrect my regular writing with a #100DaysToOffload challenge last year; that didn’t quite get over the finish line. I do, as ever, intend to write more, in public, again.

Loss

Despite my enthusiasm for my previous work, and things I learned through side projects… it has been a rough couple of years.

We lost my dear mother in October. She gave me everything, and was with me through many challenges in life; I’m now the only one left, and that is a weird and lonely feeling. In the past couple of years I’ve also lost both of my uncles, so it feels as though family is shrinking.

Another significant blow was the unexpected departure of a friend, DJ Walker-Morgan aka “Codepope”. I’d known DJ for a long time, and since the pandemic I became involved with a maker group he’d built in Wimbledon. A few of us have banded together to continue HackWimbledon in his memory.

A milestone

This year, I turned 50.

The future?

I can say very little that is certain. Life, indeed, changes. I’m feeling only lightly hopeful, at this point.

The only major fixed points in time that I know about are the upcoming Electromagnetic Field 2026 (we’ll be trading in the Night Market every night, and enjoying the overall atmosphere; I’ve also been working on some, erm, duck-related content); and the scheduled HackWimbledon meetups between now and the end of July. We also need to work out my mother’s estate; a sad and traumatising experience, that involves dismantling my childhood home.

One thing that I know is that my entire outlook has changed, since the heady days of the mid-2010s, enjoying life (and benefits) at Twitter, when I was part of what we now usually refer to as “Big Tech”.

I can see that there are through lines - people, community, compassion - in my outlook, over my life so far; but fundamentally, I want to be helping to make the world better for others. It’s far more important to me than ever, to work in a mission-oriented team, on issues that matter.

I’m an experienced technology leader with a history of bringing together communities and organisations. I have deep knowledge of a wide range of technologies, as well as strong understanding of their implications and connections to public policy and real world user experiences.

If you’d like to work with me; want to connect me to an organisation; or know of an opportunity that you think might suit my skills and worldview - please drop me a line.

In the meantime, I’ll be getting things together for EMF; and, continuing to noodle with the idea of recording my own (post-Big Tech) podcast. You can follow me in various places online, some of which are linked through the little icons at the bottom of this newsletter.

Finally, I hope things are going as well as they can for you, in this topsy-turvy world. Stay safe. Resist fascism. Care for others. Stay hopeful. Take care!